


Tell Me You Love Me (And Then Walk Away)

by cecilia095



Category: New Girl
Genre: F/M, Future Fic, I Love You, five times fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-17
Updated: 2016-03-17
Packaged: 2018-05-27 06:05:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6272755
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cecilia095/pseuds/cecilia095
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"The point is, I love ya', and so will the rest of the world. No matter where you end up."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tell Me You Love Me (And Then Walk Away)

**Author's Note:**

> Five times Nick tells Jess he loves her.
> 
> \--
> 
> Some of this is canon. Most of this is not. For a timeline breakdown:
> 
> 1\. Season 2, "Re-Launch" / 2. Season 3, before "Mars Landing" / 3. Schmidt/Cece's wedding / 4. A year later / 5. Another year later

TIME NUMBER ONE

 

She gets fired. Fired. "Jessica Day" and "fired" don't belong in the same sentence. "Jessica Day" and "Employee of the Month"? Maybe. "Jessica Day" and "Good Samaritan Who Always Files Her Taxes On Time?" Okay. Super believable, super true.   
  
"So, you're _really_  taking this unemployment thing seriously, huh?", Nick asks, in his smug _Nick Voice_ , and Jess lets her glasses slide down her nose and she just stares at him. "It's just... This is Day Six without a bra, Jess. Don't you need support?"  
  
She's like, a B Cup, at best, so... "No! The only _support_  I need is from you clowns, A.K.A. don't yell at me for doing crafts on our dining room table and let me cry to that Josh Groban CD in Schmidt's car."  
  
"You want support?" He's bobbing his head at her and he's biting down on his lip and he looks like a madman right now. (Fun fact: Nick Miller looks like a madman when he's trying to make a point. It's annoying ninety-nine percent of the time, but one percent of the time, Jess kind of likes it.)  
  
"I'll give you support!", he finishes, and then he grabs her by the wrist and hoists her off the couch, and tells her to stop whining about the fact that he messed up the scarf she's been knitting when he pulled her arm.  
  
"It's September and it's Los Angeles. Nice try, ya clown."  
  
"It's September and I'm unemployed. Nick! The school year has already started. How the hell am I supposed to find a job now?"  
  
Nick wrinkles his nose and just looks at her for a second, and then he goes, "Put on a bra and figure it out, damn it!"  
  
"What?" She's laughing at him, but she also wants to punch him in the face, a little bit.  
  
"Tough love. Winston said it'd work on you, but I don't know how to do a 'Cop Voice', so..."  
  
"Winston can't practice tough love. Do you remember who Winston is? He cries every time that sad dog commercial comes on TV."  
  
"Please. We _all_  cry, Jessica."  
  
Fair point.

Nick shakes his head and says he's not gonna let her sit on the couch and pity herself, and -- "I'm not  _pitying myself_ Nick, I'm  _feeling bad for myself_! Oh.  _Oh_."

"That's right," he says -- again, smugly, because he gets off on being a smart ass, probably. Two years of living with the guy and he  _still_ Happy-Dances when he's right. (Which is rare. He's  _Nick_.)

"Where are we even going? There's no jobs on the _roof_." 

Despite her protests, Nick tugs her up to the roof, Jess's feet dragging on the ground behind him, because, "I don't even have on a bra, Nick!"

"That didn't stop you Sunday through Friday," he says, and then he turns around to face her and makes two little circles in front of his chest. "I'm Jessica Day, and I have boobs, and I use them to  _taunt_ people! Boobs, boobs, boobs."

"Oh, do my boobs _bother you_ , Miller?", Jess asks, wiggling her eyebrows, and then she squeezes past Nick and his "boobs" and steps out onto the rooftop. 

"I mean, no, they're nice, just --" He stops himself and shuts the door to the roof behind the two of them. "Welcome to the First Day Of Your New Life, Jessica Damn Day."

"You said that same exact thing once before, you can't use it again," she says, wagging a finger at him. He looks confused, and then she elaborates. "When I funneled beer out of Winston's sock during True American that one time, remember?"

He presses his lips together and goes, "Not really, but I'll take your word for it. No. I mean, you're gonna start liking yourself again, Jess."

"Oh, God, if you brought me up here to talk about masturbating, Miller, I --"

"No, Jess, holy crap, this is about you walking around our apartment moping about how much your life sucks," he says, and then he inches in closer to her. "Life kind of  _does_ suck, okay? But you, Jess, you don't suck. Stop thinking you do just because some stupid school let you go."

Jess opens her mouth to argue, because she's Jess and she doesn't even know why they're on the roof right now when there's scarves that have to be knit, and why is  _Nick_  pretending to care so much, and --

"You're a lot bigger than that school, and everyone else who made you feel like you couldn't do something," Nick says after a few seconds of Jess just  _grilling_ him. It's very Un-Nick, to be this nice, -- especially to Unemployed Jess. "Look, I don't know when you'll find your next job, because the world has a shitty way of working sometimes, and sometimes people as good as you Jess, they end up working at like, McDonald's or --"

Jess stops him to cringe, and then he retracts his last statement. 

"Fine, you won't end up at McDonald's, but could you imagine the discount you'd get me on fries?"

"Get to the point, Nick," she says, and now her arms are folded across her chest because this roof is cold and she  _should've_ brought her almost-finished scarf out here with her.

"The point is, I love ya', and so will the rest of the world. No matter where you end up."

—

 

TIME NUMBER TWO

 

"I love you" changes when you're dating someone; when you're sitting in bed with them on a Sunday morning and their breath doesn't taste like honey and their hair is in your mouth and they haven't showered since Friday night.

They wake up in Nick's bed, because it's just easier, because they always end up sleeping here even though Jess's room is an equal radius from the living room as Nick's room is.

(Jess doesn't tell Nick this, but his comforter is a little more adult than her comforter, because  _Hellooooo, IKEA sale in 2001_ , and this relationship with Nick, well... It's a little more grown-up than Paul Genzlinger or Spencer The Cheater or the random string of weirdos she met on that mostly-risky dating website in 2010.)

Nick wakes up first, which is funny, because Jess is supposed to be the Early Riser. It's 10:02 A.M. and everyone else is already up and in the kitchen talking about the wild -- short, because Winston set the stove on fire and Schmidt lost a shoe and Cece and Coach _said_ they were done making out forever but they made out in the stall in the bathroom  _anyway_ \-- game of True American that went down last night.

"Hey," he whispers, and then he kisses her shoulder, because he half-wants her to wake up and he half-knows she won't if he kisses her soft enough. "Jessica."

Jess rolls over on her side and swipes at the drool -- booze (?) -- on the sides of her mouth. Sexy, romantic, etcetera, etcetera. Nick likes her like this, though.

"Hi." Her voice is all raspy. "What time did we even come in here last night?"

Nick squints at the faint memory of Last Night and laughs because he remembers, in order: 1. Giving Jess a piggyback until she got dizzy and threw up on Schmidt's shoes. (Right. That's how he lost the shoe. He threw it out the window.), 2. Pausing the game for a pee break and catching Cece and Coach in a... compromising position against their bathroom stall. (He screamed, "Neither of you live here, don't do this in my pee space!" at them.), 3. Tucking Jess into bed and kissing her forehead. (She laughed and said, "I like that, Nicky", and he laughed back and said, "My mom calls me 'Nicky', Jess.").

"Doesn't matter," he says with a shrug, and then he hovers over her. "How'd you sleep?"

She laughs sarcastically, and then her head hits the back of the pillow and she squeezes her eyes shut. "I don't remember. Feels like ten minutes."

He likes her in the morning, when she's all disoriented and half-asleep and paying more attention to how comfy the bed feels than to the man in bed next to her.

"Go back to sleep, kid," he directs, and Jess shakes her head and says that she can't, because, "They'll all starve if I don't cook breakfast."

"I got it," Nick says, and then he climbs out of bed, and -- Oh! Hey Schmidt's shoe with puke all over it, how'd you get  _there_?. 

Thirty minutes and a lot of wasted eggs later, he slides a tray onto Jess's lap and says, "I forgot the grapefruit. I'll be right back."

"No! Stay." She sits up and holds the tray by the sides, and then she bites into her toast and smiles at him, mouth full and everything. "Nick."

"Jess." He says her name just like she said his. "What's up, Buttercup?"

"'Buttercup'?", she teases, cringing and dropping her toast onto the plate.

"Sorry. I'm working on cute names. You okay, Jess?"

She nods and just looks at him, and she's always looking at him like this, because he's hers and she's his and they can look at each other like that, now.

When she doesn't say anything, Nick slides back into bed and watches her nibble at her toast and scrambled eggs, and then he puts one of his hands in hers.

"I love you, Jess," he says, like it's always been this easy for him to say 'I love you' to a girl. 

She squeezes his hand with the hand that's  _not_ holding toast and goes, "I know you do, Nick."

—

 

TIME NUMBER THREE

 

Weddings are beautiful and sacred and amazing, and they bring everyone together. Seriously. How many Sappy TV Show Moments take place at weddings? Jess runs out of fingers when she tries to count.

But sometimes...

Sometimes they're more than beautiful and sacred and amazing. Sometimes they're held in an abandoned warehouse and your best friend's dress has a slot for batteries that you can't rip off for the life of you and Winston's cat eats the groom's vows two hours before the ceremony and Groomsmen Number Five is allergic to the flowers in the bouquet and Groomsmen Number Three knocks over a whole table of hors d'oeuvres before the wedding even starts and the only thing that gets you through the day is the damn Best Man.

They find each other on the toilet in the Women's Room.

"Nick!", Jess screams when the stall door flings open, and  _Thank God_ she pulled her tights back up before he barged in. "This is the Ladies' Room."

"Do you want to guess what the Men's Room smells like right now, Jess?"

She wrinkles her nose and then rolls her eyes when Nick takes a seat on the toilet next to her and tells her to, "Scoot". "Um. Depends. Who's... in there?"

"G1  _and_ G4."

"Winston and Robby? I can only imagine. I think I'm good with that --  _imagining_. No need to describe the smell in excruciating detail or anything, Miller."

Nick laughs and says, "I'll spare ya'." He scoots a little closer to her, and she's about to fall off of this damn toilet. "Are you hiding out in here, or does it honestly take you forty minutes to pee?"

"Umm... Both?" They both laugh. "You know I'm a slow pee-er, Nick!"

"I also know you, and I know you're hiding out in here. From what, though? Your speech was  _fine_."

"I fist-pumped and called them "Mr. and Mrs. Schmidt and Cece Telluride."

"They  _did_ pick that last name out together, so..."

"It's a terrible last name," Jess says, face palming.

"The worst. I hope that's not the name on their actual marriage license. Jesus."

Jess sighs and feels Nick's thigh rub against hers. "Their first dance was great, though."

"Weirdly choreographed, but yeah," Nick agrees. "So you ready to go back out there, or do you  _really_ like the smell of clogged toilets and cheap hand sanitizer?"

"I just..." Jess pushes her bangs out of her face, and she doesn't get up from the toilet when Nick goes to get up from the toilet. "Is this how it's going to be at every wedding, Nick? Me and you, on a toilet. God, will I be alone on a toilet at your wedding? Who will I hang out with on the toilet at your wedding, Nick?!"

Nick gets red in the face, and he slides a hand down onto the small of her back. "Jess, I won't let you hang out on a toilet at our wedding."

"At -- At -- You said 'our', so you -- Nick --"

They've talked about it these past few weeks. Mostly because Cece and Schmidt gave them Wedding Fever, but also because they're not getting any younger and now it's just Jess and Nick and Winston in the loft when Cece and Schmidt get back from their honeymoon, and all of this just came up while they were curling ribbons for the wedding favors together.

"Jess." He sighs, and so does Jess. "I'm not gonna let ya' be a Toilet Person."

Jess wants to say something, but she doesn't.

"I love you," he says for the first time in two years. It's different than the 'I love you' he texted her -- as a friend -- when she went on that job interview, and it's different than when he said, "You're the best, I love you!" when she let him eat the leftover batter the night she made cupcakes for the School Board Meeting. 

Jess purses her lips and nods slowly, and then without thinking, she says, "I love you too."

They ditch the toilet and do the Chicken Dance with Schmidt and Winston, for old times' sake.

Everything feels okay again.

—

 

TIME NUMBER FOUR

 

Life is weird, and for awhile, it slows down and you think you can handle it, but then it gets fast again and you're not caught up to speed with everybody else your age, and now Jess knows why Cece got all freaked out before she got married last year because change is scary and weird and  _scary_.

One day, you're living with four other people and your house is almost too cluttered to  _move_ properly, and then all of a sudden two-fifths of them are gone and you can finally get into your fridge without tripping on a pair of shoes or something.

Winston tells them he's moving out the day after Cece and Schmidt announce they're having their first baby.

"You're  _what_?!"

"With  _who_?!"

"Just leave the cat, man, he's used to it here."

"Are they sending you back to Latvia?! But yeah, I agree with Nick, leave the cat."

Winston folds his hands on the tabletop and clears his throat. He's more adult lately, more adult than Nick and Jess who sleep together sometimes and flirt like first graders with a crush and still are so in love that they feel a little ping in the back of their throat when they try to do something about it.

"Look, Aly and I are getting serious, but we can't be serious if I live in a loft with you clowns," Winston says. 

Nick and Jess like Aly, and they love Aly with Winston, so they're happy for him, they are, but --

"The -- The two of us are just what, we're supposed to live here alone?"

Winston laughs under his breath and goes, "Well... yeah..."

"That can't -- We can't -- Winston, who will cook us crepes?"

"Jess actually makes a pretty decent crepe, Nick, so you're good."

Jess takes a tiny bow and points to herself. "It's true. But wait! Winston, are you sure this is what you want? I mean, Aly's great, but are you ready to live together?"

"More than ready," Winston says confidently. Since when is Winston confident. About  _love_? 

Jess taps her fingers on the counter and bites her lip, and she's not looking at Nick. "O...kay. Well. Then. Winston, I'm so happy for you!" She gets out of her chair and races over to where Winston is sitting and wraps him in a hug. "This is really happening, huh?"

"We're moving into a bigger place. Aly's is small -- shoebox. I like shoeboxes, but Aly refuses to live with my cat in her current place, and I  _have_ to take Furguson. Who else gonna give him his butt pill?"

Nick retracts his whole thing about how Winston should leave the cat behind. 

**

Winston moves out two weeks later, and Jess is so sad about it that she sleeps in what used to be his room because, "I don't know, the bed still smells like him, don't you think?"

"He took all of his blankets, Jessica. You're sniffing a mattress."

"Come lay with me on Winston's empty mattress and let me cry about how much everything sucks right now, huh?"

Nick does. He spoons her from behind and lets her cry and tells her he's a little scared about how fast everything's changing, too.

**

They turn Winston's old room into an office. (Slash-Craft Room, because Jess has  _so_ many crafts and  _so_ little room.)

One day, it's random and it happens for no rhyme or reason, but Nick presses Jess up against the door of Winston's old room -- ahem, Office-Craft-Video Game- I Come Here To Think Room (they're still working on a name).

Jess lifts her thigh up and lets it rub against Nick's torso, and then she moans his name when he sucks at the skin of her neck.

"This apartment is mine and yours now, babe," he says, his voice scratchy, Jess's body up against his.

It scares Jess, that statement, but it also makes her happy. She laughs and pecks him on the lips and goes, "We did it! We outlived everyone else in 4D! We're the True Roommates!"

" _Roomfriends_ ," he corrects her, and her nose wrinkles at the throwback, the time in the bar years ago when Nick couldn't call Jess anything besides his 'roomfriend'. 

"You know." He gulps, and then he kisses her in between words. "I do love you."

—

 

TIME NUMBER FIVE

 

"Jessica Day" and "Nick Miller" belong in the same sentence. They always have.

The calligraphy on their wedding invitations looks  _insane_. (Schmidt: "I know a guy." Nick: "Why do you have a calligraphy guy, Schmidt? You printed your wedding invites at  _Staples_." Schmidt: "Sure, but I obviously had my calligraphy guy announce the birth of my daughter on his finest stationery, you idiot.")

It took them awhile to catch up to everyone else, but Nick insists that, "I don't know, maybe this wasn't supposed to be a rushed thing."

Weddings are beautiful and sacred and amazing, and they bring everyone together, and the Miller-Day wedding is all of that and more. (Mostly more. It's a ridiculous day, but at least it's a good story to tell to their kids, and strangers in the elevator, and, -- "Okay, Jessica, you didn't need to make a Facebook status about me sneezing into the cake when you shoved it in my face!")

**

"I love you" changes when you're married to someone; every silly little fight -- "Toilet seat is up, again, Nick! I have a petite bottom, and I  _fell in_!" "No way, go back, I need a picture!", every morning when there's only time for a, "Here's your coffee!" and a quick peck, every time that they realize they were never behind anyone else in the first place, that they just needed a little time to get in front of the way they felt about each other.

"Jessica Day-Miller-Zenith --"

"That's not our last name, Nick, you can't just steal that from Schmidt's List of Potential Married Last Names."

"He didn't use it, so I'm usin' it!"

" _Fine_."

She loves him so much. He's by the stove making her eggs because she's in her late-thirties and she still gets tipsy after two shots at the bar and he knows her recipe for Hangover Eggs by heart, now.

"I," he says, pausing, "love", another pause, "the way this apron makes my hips look."

"I hate you," she says, groaning through Nick's teasing and her killer headache and the fact that she and Nick kissed so many times before they got out of bed this morning yet her lips still taste like tequila.

"I love you so much, Jess."

"I knowww, baby, I love you more, just make me my eggs."

"I'll make you Hangover Eggs until like, 2098."

Jess wrinkles her nose. Right now she'd be lucky to make it into 2025. This hangover? She's a goner.

"2100. You're not running out on me before the next century, Miller."

"Zenith."

" _Fine_. We can be Zenith in 2100."

Nick flips Jess's eggs onto a plate and slides them to her at the counter and then he leans over and lets his lips linger onto hers.

This was always how it was supposed to go.


End file.
